CAAN preliminary conclusion blames bad weather for Tara Air plane crash

KATHMANDU, May 30: The Tara Air Twin-Otter plane crashed due to bad weather, a preliminary investigation by the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal (CAAN) shows. 

CAAN director general Pradeep Adhikari informed the meeting of the International Committee of the Parliament today that the Tara Air plane met with the accident because of the inclement weather. 

He said a preliminary investigation showed that the aircraft which should have made a right turn instead took a left turn due to the bad weather and crashed into a hillside. 

The CAAN director general assured of finding the truth behind the incident by forming an investigation commission and conducting further investigation. 

The crash site is at a distance of eight nautical miles from the Jomsom Airport. The wreckage of the airplane was found this morning at the Sanusare cliff at Thasang rural municipality-2 of Mustang district.

Twenty-two people including 19 passengers and three crew members were killed in the plane crash. The plane that had taken off from Pokhara Airport at 9.55 went out of contact at 10.7 am Sunday. It was flying towards Jomsom, Mustang. 

Five helicopters were mobilized to search for the plane the whole day on Sunday soon after it was reported missing. But bad weather hampered the search. The wreckage of the plane was found by a mechanism that had been mobilized early this morning today, it is said.